Slashdot Mirror

Aaron Cherrington writes "Bob Frankston has written an article in which he declares that Bluetooth has failed. The article states that despite the fact it is wireless, it still has all of the limitations of wires. Is it too early to declare the death of Bluetooth, or can we can expect more out of it?"

angst7 writes "ZDNet is reporting that Microsoft has signed an agreement which would allow the Chinese government access to Windows source code. This is part of an effort to curb the shift toward Linux in China due to that country's concerns regarding the security of closed source software." Reader NZheretic points out that less than a year ago, Jim Allchin swore under oath that disclosing the Windows operating system source code could damage national security.

gsfprez writes "Its been a while ... and strangely, the world almost seemed empty without the constant drumbeat of how Apple is on the verge of going out of business. If you're a fan like i am, then you're in luck, because this Canadian tech journalist didn't get the memo that Apple's been going out of business longer than most tech journalists have been in business. And besides, someone needs to let Robert Thomson know: when writing a story on how Apple is about to die, you have to call them "beleaguered". Come on, that's Tech Journalism 101, people. In any case, he brings up no new points to bolster his argument: he confuses his personal inability to use third-party software that works fine for most of us with legitimate bad third-party support, and uses this to draw his illogical conclusion. Illogical because it's the same reasons/unrealized conclusions that were the staple of tech journalism from 1985-1999."

gsfprez writes "Its been a while ... and strangely, the world almost seemed empty without the constant drumbeat of how Apple is on the verge of going out of business. If you're a fan like i am, then you're in luck, because this Canadian tech journalist didn't get the memo that Apple's been going out of business longer than most tech journalists have been in business. And besides, someone needs to let Robert Thomson know: when writing a story on how Apple is about to die, you have to call them "beleaguered". Come on, that's Tech Journalism 101, people. In any case, he brings up no new points to bolster his argument: he confuses his personal inability to use third-party software that works fine for most of us with legitimate bad third-party support, and uses this to draw his illogical conclusion. Illogical because it's the same reasons/unrealized conclusions that were the staple of tech journalism from 1985-1999."

SmackCrackAndPot writes "On the TiVo Community forum, there is an announcement that TiVo will be switching off UK sales. This was previously reported in November at BizTech Library. It's probably not too surprising, after the BBC spammed TiVo owners with a new comedy show."

haplo21112 writes "There is a posting over at ZDNet about how Hollywood continues to trample on the American consumer's free use rights. They want to prevent the sale of a special DVD player which can be used to edit out offensive material from a DVD in realtime. While I don't agree with censorship in general, I do believe its everyone's right to do what they wish with their own media."

haplo21112 writes "There is a posting over at ZDNet about how Hollywood continues to trample on the American consumer's free use rights. They want to prevent the sale of a special DVD player which can be used to edit out offensive material from a DVD in realtime. While I don't agree with censorship in general, I do believe its everyone's right to do what they wish with their own media."

UVwarning writes with his review of the Philips Streamium MCi-200. "The MCi-200 is an internet micro hi-fi system introduced in selected locations in the latter half of last year. Here is a press release. I've had my Streamium for about 3 months and I really love it, but it is not everything that I thought it would be. For those of you who are thinking of getting one, you need to know the truth about it. The following paragraphs consist mostly of my complaints. If you want a more general and/or lovey-dovey review click here." UVWarning addresses below the unit's performance with various music sources, and has some words about Philips's tech support.

Internet Streams After logging into myPhilips.com with a web browser and adjusting your account settings, the Streamium will be able to connect to myPhilips.com and from there access any radio stations that you have configured. Unfortunately Philips seems to be keeping tight control on which internet radio stations customers can access. Not only are the number of stations relatively limited, but some of them you have to pay for. A couple of months ago, Philip's online FAQ stated, in response to whether or not users can select their own radio stations that are not listed on Philips website, that (and this is the exact quote) "Future software update release will cater for this feature." Now they have changed it to say that "In the future it will be possible to have different online music services accessed via myPhilips.com" So what are they saying? That they will simply have a larger selection available, but will not allow you to select your own? That's a bit annoying, but then I can't really see them being able to charge for premium services and allow users to access any station they want to.

PC Streams The PC-Link feature allows you to stream MP3s from any PC on your LAN. Unfortunately PC-Link software is not only proprietary, but it only runs on Windows and it requires you to download the trial version of MusicMatch Jukebox. This is obviously very inconvenient for a non-Windows user and what I find to be even more annoying than that, is that in addition to their browser requirements on myPhilips.com, there is an OS requirement. You can only access myPhilips.com if you are running Windows or MacOS -- Try it, I'm not kidding! I want to strangle whoever the webmaster of that website is. I have to reboot into my Windows partition every time I want to change some setting on my account.

CDs MP3 CDs / MP3-Pro CDs / CD-Rs / CD-RWs are all supported, however it doesn't seem to like any of the CD-Rs that I burn. They seem to work fine in other players, but when I stick any of them into my streamium, it gets confused and won't eject the CD unless I unplug the power cord and plug it back in (the power button doesn't work in this situation). CD-RWs surprisingly work just fine.

Tech Support When I couldn't get the PC-Link feature to work, I called tech support. Needless to say they were no help. This is a new product to them and I don't think they are used to dealing with software type issues. They kept telling me to unplug and plug all of the cables. Whatever... Later on I figured out on my own that it was because my AT&T Global Network Client that I was using for work had installed a permanent software firewall that I did not know about and so I disabled it and everything was peachy.

Other
FYI Here are some other internet audio appliances:

• Kerbango (3Com's dead linux-based Internet Radio Appliance)
  
• Audiotron (Turtle Beach/PC streams)
  
• Simplefi (Motorola/Wireless/Internet or PC streams)

An anonymous reader writes "ZDNet is running a story on what a lot of us already know: Linux IS cheaper than Windows. This not because it is free. It is because Linux admins, although slightly more expensive, can handle a significantly larger number of systems than their Windows counterparts."

vinsci writes "Sometimes, reader comments to reporter-written stories are just as good as the stories themselves. Such as David Mohring's comment yesterday on ZDNet.com's story Mono & .Net: The odd couple. Since Microsoft are now using their licensing terms to stop GPL and LGPL free software, it would be a welcome sign of free software maturity at Microsoft if they actually resolved the Mono issue. The gist of his comment: 'Microsoft's CEOs have made it 'patently' clear that they intend to restrict competing .Net implementations by cultivating Microsoft's patents, [...] Mono also implements parts of .NET that have NOT been submitted to ECMA and ISO standards. Those parts of Mono lack even the protection for IP infringement with re-implementation that ISO documentation licensing implies. [...] There [are] those that claim that .NET is open to re-implementation, but until Microsoft make a simliar public legal declaration to Sun's JSPA, any .NET re-implementation represents a pending legal mindfield.' While on the subject of C# development, users of the GPL'd C# development environment SharpDevelop may also want to try Eclipse together with the Open Source Improve CSharp plugin for Eclipse. Eclipse also support C/C++ these days using GCC and GDB, thanks to the CDT. There are about two hundred add-on plugins available for Eclipse. Eclipse itself is available for many platforms, including Linux with native GTK 2 support."

vinsci writes "Sometimes, reader comments to reporter-written stories are just as good as the stories themselves. Such as David Mohring's comment yesterday on ZDNet.com's story Mono & .Net: The odd couple. Since Microsoft are now using their licensing terms to stop GPL and LGPL free software, it would be a welcome sign of free software maturity at Microsoft if they actually resolved the Mono issue. The gist of his comment: 'Microsoft's CEOs have made it 'patently' clear that they intend to restrict competing .Net implementations by cultivating Microsoft's patents, [...] Mono also implements parts of .NET that have NOT been submitted to ECMA and ISO standards. Those parts of Mono lack even the protection for IP infringement with re-implementation that ISO documentation licensing implies. [...] There [are] those that claim that .NET is open to re-implementation, but until Microsoft make a simliar public legal declaration to Sun's JSPA, any .NET re-implementation represents a pending legal mindfield.' While on the subject of C# development, users of the GPL'd C# development environment SharpDevelop may also want to try Eclipse together with the Open Source Improve CSharp plugin for Eclipse. Eclipse also support C/C++ these days using GCC and GDB, thanks to the CDT. There are about two hundred add-on plugins available for Eclipse. Eclipse itself is available for many platforms, including Linux with native GTK 2 support."

Roland Piquepaille writes "My favorite forecaster, Gartner, is back with a new series of predictions about the way we'll interact with our computing devices. Here is the introduction. 'Human-computer interfaces will rapidly improve during the next decade. The wide availability of cheaper display technologies will be one of the most transformational events in the IT industry.' Not exactly a scoop, isn't? But wait, here is a real prediction. 'Computer screens will become ubiquitous in the everyday environment.' Ready for another prediction? 'Through 2012, more than 95 percent (by volume in gigabytes) of human-to-computer information input will remain keyboard- and mouse-based.' Check this column for a summary."

Megor writes "Well it was bound to happen, people are cheating on Seti@home to inflate their work unit statistics, and the people who administer Seti are ignoring the complaints. ZDNET has an article explaining how they are cheating."

Greg Smith points to this ZDNet story on new Intel chips aimed at blade servers, writing "Proprietary blade servers are coming on strong from IBM, Dell and HP. Where are the open blade servers? How did Google roll out 10,000 servers at such a low cost?"

ggruschow writes "AMD's CTO says their 2.0-Ghz Opteron (aka Hammer) beat a 2.8-Ghz Xeon (P4) on both SPECint2000 and SPECfp2000 tests, but was mixed against an Intel 1-Ghz Itanium 2 (details at ExtremeTech). IBM predicted "conservative" 1.8-Ghz PowerPC 970 scores, which fall in the middle of the pack (sweet for OS X). It's probably not a coincidence that AMD's news comes so soon after Gartner said x86-64 would fail. Even if Intel loses the performance crown again, their upcoming mobile processor is looking pretty spiff with its recently announced 1MB of cache. Sounds like next year might finally bring a worthy upgrade for my 486dx4-160."

netphilter writes "This article on ZDNet writes: "A "honeypot" trap consisting of a Wi-Fi-equipped laptop is the latest weapon against drive-by hackers." Although I'm sure that I've heard of this somewhere before, it appears that the latest twist is that this company is looking to sell them to corporations. Hmm...I wonder what the warchalking symbol for a honeypot really would look like?"

caudron writes "According to an article at ZDNet, a trade group partly funded, not surprisingly, by Microsoft's competitors is claiming that WinXP SP1 and Win2k SP3 contain 6 separate violations of both the letter and spirit of the proposed DOJ Settlement. Equally unsurprising, Microsoft disagrees with them. And so the Case-That-Wouldn't-Die drags ever onward."

Slashback tonight with a few words on forcing Open software, NASA mind-reading tricks, a reminder of one nice way not to pay for an MP3 decoder, and more. Read on for the details. Update: 08/28 00:36 GMT by T : Oops -- No DoubleClick news tonight, as the original headline implied. Regrets.

They felt your unvoiced contempt. perl-guy writes "According to a recent NASA press release, reports such as those in this Slashdot story stating that NASA is planning to develop mind-reading equipment for airports in efforts against terrorism are exaggerated and ignore the facts and science behind current research. 'NASA does not have the capability to read minds, nor are we suggesting that would be done,' said Robert Pearce, Director, NASA's Strategy and Analysis Division in the Office of Aerospace Technology in Washington. 'Our scientists were asked to think outside the box with regards to ideas that could aid the nation in the war on terrorism and that's what they are doing. We have not approved any research in this area and because of the sensitivity of such research, we will seek independent review before we do.'"

Let's put that Schneier fellow on the "body-search" list. Quixotic1 writes "Four articles are highlighted over at The Atlantic Online arguing that to protect ourselves against terrorism we must rely on people, not simply on technology. The outline touches on the recent article about Bruce Schneier, the national ID card proposal, and the Clipper Chip."

Star systems, slip through fingers, etc. Since Thomson Multimedia / the Frauenhofer Institute has decided to press the $0.75-per-decoder charge for MP3 decoders mentioned earlier today, there are probably a lot of people suddenly more interested in other formats. I favor the Xiph Foundation's Ogg Vorbis; Xiph CEO Emmett Plant has written his thank-you note to Thomson Multimedia.

Depends what you consider "great." morhoj writes "ZDNet is running a great commentary that talks about the recent debate involving the Digital Software Security Act (the California law the would force governments to use open source software). ''Open source is supposed to be about freedom. Unfortunately, certain advocates have lost sight of that goal.'' I couldn't have summed it up better myself. Forcing anyone to use Open Source software is no better than ludicrous Microsoft licensing agreements." I think Carroll is dead-wrong when he focuses on cost-benefit analyses (and ignores the question of whose money is being spent by whom, for what), but YMMV.

I bet they'd have to edit Super Troopers, too. David_Bloom writes: "Following up on an earlier article, according to a page (link is a direct link to a frame - context sold separately) on the IMAX website, the first movie to use 35mm to 70mm IMAX DMR technology will be the hit 1995 flick Apollo 13. It is interesting to note that, according to a FilmRatings.com lookup, the film has been edited for content for its IMAX release (which is bad news for people hoping to see The Matrix or similar movies on IMAX)."

No, I said I'm meet you by the other telescope! Reader Dan Yocum points out that the skyward-gazing Yalies who captured asteroid 2002 NY40 digitally did so with a different telescope than the one reported. He writes: "They weren't even using WIYN. They were using the 0.9M that's next to it (about 50yd away)." Thanks for the correction!

Andonyx writes "There's already a review out on Zdnet regarding Danger's Hiptop PDA / Phone device. It looks very interesting and the review is mostly positive. It has some minor niggles, but concludes that it is a compelling and polished first gen offering."

Aetius writes "The Center for Internet Security has released a set of security standards and tools for several operating systems. Here's the ZDNet story. I checked out the Linux standard and it is a pretty good coverage of the basics; about the only thing missing was a simple firewall treatment. I installed it on my wide-open desktop system (RH 7.3) and scored a 6.61 out of 10, which doesn't seem too bad. The scanner code isn't open source, but it's perl so you can at least look at it. You have to register to download it. If nothing else, the PDF of the standards is a good read. Enjoy."

lrose writes "Check out this story over at ZDNet -- Microsoft is developing a secure operating system to be combined with hardware doing public key cryptography. The DRM aspect reminds me of something I read about an imaginary day in the not-too-distant future, where you can no longer install Linux on your own box because you don't have the necessary rights." Coursey's column is quite interesting, bringing a lot more of the backstory behind Palladium into public view. While geeks have been following and worrying about the TCPA, Microsoft has been working to spin the story with assorted columnists and journalists, so that when it broke it would be in the context that Steven Levy bought into hook, line and sinker: a scheme to protect you rather than one to prevent you from using your computer in unapproved ways.

stuffman64 writes: "Popular Science is running an excellent article on just how private our daily lives are. The article chronicles a typical day of a make-believe Graphics Designer from Chicago. Throughout his day, he unwittingly supplies companies with information that can potentially be used against him. And with GPS-enabled cell phones just starting to hit the market, our privacy can only continue to deteriorate from here. A must read."

atomgiant writes "ZDNet is running an interesting article about the KDWorks hacking contest that has gone bad, or good, depending on your perspective. Entertaining read in any event." I think that Bruce Schneier has said it best on the value of contests such as this one. That the registration server was compromised I think is a telling comment on the value of whole site security.

MBCook writes: "It appears that AT&T broadband doesn't like it when customers own their own cable modem. According to this article at ZDNet, ATT will be 'changing' their prices for all users. If you own your own cable modem, your bill is going up $7. If you lease your cable modem, you end up paying the same ammount you were before. I guess AT&T likes to milk it's customers. If I don't have a long distance service with any phone company, I have to pay for the privilage of not depending on them. Now I'll have to pay for the privilage of not depending on AT&T for a modem?"

randomErr writes "ZDNET has this article about how a universal network similar the one in SE Lain will evolve. The author say it's not a matter of 'if' but 'when' this network will happen."

randomErr writes "ZDNET has this article about how a universal network similar the one in SE Lain will evolve. The author say it's not a matter of 'if' but 'when' this network will happen."

daecabhir writes "This article from ZDNet is an interesting read. Not just because of the implications of what IBM and Microsoft appear to be doing, but because it again brings to light how susceptible many standards processes continue to be to commercial interests. You would think that being early adopters, crafting the standards so that they can have the first and most compliant implementations might be enough - but I guess these companies aren't secure about the quality of their products, so they have to go down the route of intellectual property ownership, enforcement and RAND (reasonable and non-discriminatory, whatever "reasonable" means) licensing fees."

nightspd writes "David Berlind of Cnet has written a series of articles over at ZDNet about IBM's return to market dominance, including this one titled When Will IBM Buy Sun? It's a VERY interesting read and a very interesting predition, and poses a question. With the mega-merger of Compaq and Hewlett-Packard going forward, can we expect other possible mega-mergers down the line in the tech arena? Is a IBM buyout of Sun possible and/or viable?"

nightspd writes "David Berlind of Cnet has written a series of articles over at ZDNet about IBM's return to market dominance, including this one titled When Will IBM Buy Sun? It's a VERY interesting read and a very interesting predition, and poses a question. With the mega-merger of Compaq and Hewlett-Packard going forward, can we expect other possible mega-mergers down the line in the tech arena? Is a IBM buyout of Sun possible and/or viable?"

ajw1976 writes "David Coursey of ZDNet reviews iMovie in his 'Month on Mac' series. It's a pretty a good article that tells how easy it is to create a movie and burn a DVD." A lot of people seem to think home movies/photos/music (the Apple "Digital Hub") is the killer app for consumer Macs these days. iPhoto has a long way to go, but iTunes works great, and I've heard little but good about iMovie.

Slashback tonight brings you several updates and amplifications on everything from Java in phones and a GPS system in Europe, to the future of Internet audio streaming and (related) near-unbelievable proposed tariffs on nearly anything that will hold data (in Canada). Read on below for the details.

The man is not often wrong. Doc Searls writes: "I wrote a piece piece at the Linux Journal site that you might want to check out. The very first comment is 'This needs to be Slashdotted.' I agree. And not because I'm looking for attention. I want to *call* attention to the CARP Report, which will kill Webcasting with fees. It's a big deal, and I don't see anybody else talking about it. Yet. And we need to."

Would you say that these are more 'puppies," "babies," or "mommas"? Vladimir Vuksan writes: "There are already hundreds of so called Java midlets that will presumably execute on these Nokia puppies or any other Java enabled browser. Check out http://midlet.org/jsp/index.jsp"

Too bad I can't get the entire Economist free just by reading the ads. FortKnox writes: "ZDNet is running a story about generic "Ad-Free Subscription Services" being used on the internet today. The review of these services is from the 'Ad Space Buyer' and how marketing execs are not keen on the idea. Something interesting to read, seeing Slashdot is testing the services."

How about a countersuit for strong-arm tactics? iosphere writes "According to an article on Wired, the judge in BT's case issued a ruling that questions whether or not the technology that was patented is really analogous to todays definition of a hyperlink. She questions how the patent, which was written with only a single computer terminal in mind, can apply to the internet as we know it now."

Update: 03/15 00:31 GMT by T : arget writes with a few more data points: "An article at News.com suggests that Prodigy has won a TKO in the first round. Another story at ZDNet is more neutral, but quotes an expert saying that prior art will 'come back to haunt BT's efforts.' Both articles agree that motions for summary judgement and probably a ruling will come soon."

Portable Monopoly kylus writes "Roughly a month after it was last mentioned here, the Gameboy Advance light project over at Portable Monopoly takes another step closer to fruition. While the official release date is in May, the group will begin accepting preorders on Friday, March 15th for the $35 light kit, which has been officially named 'Afterburner.' In addition to this news, they've provided some video captures of the product in action."

Remember, as reader Vito puts it, that's Portable Monopoly's warranty-voiding, solder-requiring, tech-support-suiciding Gameboy Advance internal lighting kit. :) Your own risk, et cetera.

This goes beyond disputes about how to spell "meter." meehawl writes with an update on the European Union's plans for a GPS workalike system, which we had previously reported had been scrapped.

"So after the Pentagon removed GPS's Selective Availability, the maximum GPS accuracy is typically within 10 to 20 meters. Differential GPS can reduce this to minute levels, very useful for calling in airstrikes and pinpointing installations, and so on.

So it's probably no surprise that the the European Union's plans to build their own GPS system, the Galileo Project, met such stern resistance from the U.S., with Deputy Defence Secretary Paul Wolfowitz asking EU defence ministers not to go ahead, saying it could complicate US satellite-assisted warfare and furthermore could be more easily used by anti-US military forces.

The EU has has now rejected the latest message from the U.S., a State Department exhortation to forgo development. Interestingly, the latest rebuff was framed as an anti-monopoly stance, that competition in satellite navigation would be good for business.

Apparently, Osama is responsible for this latest rebirth of the European space industry.

Perhaps more worryingly, in a related development a UK company was awarded the "Skynet 5" military communications system contract. Don't these people watch movies at all?"

The principle of the thing. Boone^ writes "It's been well covered, but The Tech Report has written a nice little article going through the finer points of the proposed levy and why there should be more people than just Canadians lobbying against it."

Perhaps some more apprentices will emerge from the woodwork? pynchin writes "Kyle Sallee, creator of Sorcerer GNU Linux has just announced on #sorcerer that he will no longer be involved with SGL. Some disgruntled SGL users forked the distro a few days ago -- see www.lunar-penguin.com for details."

A reader writes "ZDNet News is running an editorial about the choice of programming languages for developers today. The author suggests that developers have been left with little choice because all of the current programming languages are essentially the same."

dlek writes: "ZDNet is running an article in which a Microsoft .Net engineer declares HTTP's days are numbered. (For those of you just tuning in, HTTP is the primary protocol for the world-wide web.) Among the tidbits in this manifesto is the inference that HTTP is problematic primarily because it's asymmetric--it's not peer-to-peer, therefore it's obsolete. Hey everybody, P2P was around long before Napster, and was rejected when client-server architecture was more appropriate!"

It's been a while since the last iteration of Slashback, so tonight there are updates and errata on several recent stories. Read on below to find out more about Harlan Ellison's battle with copyright infringers, why modding your Linksys WAP might not be as cool as you thought, internet access in Wellington, New Zealand, the results of the NASA poll on space priorities and more.

How many anecdotes? Drestin writes "Looks like all the flame mail and traffic to WinInfo for the recent 'Windows more secure than Linux' article prompted it's author, Paul Thurrott, to reply with his opinion. He tells us to think with our heads, not our hearts."

Several readers complained about my original (since updated) headline, and they're all right. As Kathleen Ellis put it:

"I find this title to be rather misleading. Bugtraq is a security mailing list that happens to be archived on security focus' web site (it is also moderated by one of SecurityFocus' founders, but bugtraq content is not subjected to SecurityFocus editorial control), and WinInformant is really the one making the assertion, based on their analysis of Bugtraq list traffic.

As an occasional SecurityFocus reader (and occasional writer), I am particularly concerned that your headline (and the attribution of the assertion to SecurityFocus) will make SecurityFocus look bad. As a professional in "the industry" and as someone who follows computer security very closely, I am confident most sensible members of the security community will quickly realize that the assertion is of extremely dubious merit and your attribution could make SecurityFocus look extremely foolish."

Here, why don't you pay? TheGeneration writes "Recently Salon had an article about public money being used to write private code (ie, for a university.) The article apparently moved Richard Stallman enough to write a response and opinion. Stallman sites his own reason for leaving MIT such as his inability to write free software while under their employ. Stallman discusses ways to sidestep University control of free software, and how to get admins to allow software developed under them to be licensed as free software."

For your personal museum's display cases. airrage writes "As a follow-up to the early design docs for some of the earliest ATARI games. More fascinating, is the 30 Secrets of Atari. Did Jobs ever do any work? Finally, the creater of ATARI's adventure has a web site. Check out his work on virtual nano-technology and his presentation on creating Adventure. They sure didn't have much to work with did they?"

Connecting everything to everything. seanadams.com writes: "Our company has just published the firmware source code for our SliMP3 Ethernet MP3 player, previously reviewed on Slashdot. The firmware, written entirely in assembler, includes our super-compact TCP/IP stack for the 8-bit PIC microcontroller. The license allows for non-commercial use, so I hope this will be of interest to PIC hackers! If you're interested in experimenting with Ethernet and TCP/IP on the PIC, we will have an integrated PIC+CS8900 module and development kits available next month."

Next stop is telepathy. ruvreve writes "An update to a previous article featured here on Slashdot. Wellington is offering not only city-wide gigabit ethernet they are also offering wireless access. Currently it is still 11Mbps but plans are to make it 56Mbps down the road."

Not someone I'd want to mess with anyhow. yndrd writes "As a follow up to a previous Slashdot story about Harlan Ellison's feud with what he considers to be pirates of his work, Ellison has reached a settlement with Critical Path Inc. who will create software that enables Ellison to immediately delete postings of his work on the RemarQ service. The (somewhat) full article is here. He's still ready to rumble with America Online, the other party in his lawsuit."

The dirty side of quick n' dirty. nailgun writes: "http://www.maokhian.com/wireless/wap11.html has before-and-after oscilloscope traces of the spectra of a power-boosted (hacked) Linksys WAP. From the traces it is apparent that power-boosting does no good, since all (or nearly all) additional power is blasted out in neighboring frequencies. Boost your Linksys and you'll step on all other WAPs in the neighborhood. These are cool pictures too."

This took a survey to determine?An Anonymous Coward writes "Remember the Space Survey Thread? Where NASA was asking for our opinion on where to go in space? Well, the results are in. Lo and behold, we all want to go to Mars."

ryuko writes: "Normally LANs are used by a single organization at best, but Wellington's 13-square-mile LAN comprises many of the city's businesses. The city council garnered a UNESCO Digital Access Award in recognition of its achievement in installing the 1,000 Mbps network. The full article is here on ZDNet. Drool ... gigabit internet ..."

nihilist_1137 writes: "Zdnet has a story on how companies are looking at making gamers pay to play online games. It goes over the problem of how to make a game great but yet at the same time appealing to people who pick it up."

A number of readers have collected stories concerning the change of focus by Bill Gates to security. Bruce Schneier and Adam Shostack have written a piece, while Crag Mundie of MSFT has also chimed in, along with some commentary from ZD folks. SecurityFocus has other words, as does InfoWarrior.

vasah20 writes: "ZDNet.com has this article saying that Yahoo is starting a pay-per-search service for 'premium documents,' in attempt to offset some of its revenue losses. Maybe it's just me, but if people can already find the most relevant results on Google, what are the chances anyone's gonna use this service?"

diwolf writes "I've looked high and low, but haven't found a real Customer Relationship Manager for Linux. I used to use ACT! for Windows (bad word, blah, blah, blah), and loved it. But, I can't find anything similar on Linux. Does this mean I have to dust off my progamming skills and write my own? Or, is there an ACT! clone that's GPL'ed and just waiting for my download?" A ZDNet article from over a year ago also makes this point stating that Linux "still falls short when it comes to supporting workloads required by applications like ERP (enterprise resource planning), business intelligence, CRM (customer relationship management) and supply chain planning". Now it's a year later, and SourceForge has racked up an impressive array of CRM related projects. For those with experience with some of these Linux CRM solutions, how well do they stack up to other well known offerings in this arena?

hoyosa writes "This article on zd-net reports that Extreme Ultraviolet LLC has built the first ultraviolet lithography stand for manufacturing processors. Will this make silicone obsolete? " Some interesting bits in there. Also "Soon" means we won't see actual chips until oh, say 2005, so don't hold your breath or anything.

An anonymous reader writes "It seems that Nintendo will have a competition in the handheld market soon. ZDnet has an article that says Microsoft's plan to introduce a 'Media Pad' which includes among other things 'serve as a portable game player in conjunction with Microsoft's Xbox video game console.' So I guess the news I heard regarding their interest in the portable industry will soon come true, the question is, can they take the crown from Nintendo?"

An anonymous reader writes "It seems that Nintendo will have a competition in the handheld market soon. ZDnet has an article that says Microsoft's plan to introduce a 'Media Pad' which includes among other things 'serve as a portable game player in conjunction with Microsoft's Xbox video game console.' So I guess the news I heard regarding their interest in the portable industry will soon come true, the question is, can they take the crown from Nintendo?"

freakboy303 writes "ZDNet has a short article that can be found here , It basically talks about what the last couple of year of gloom and doom mean for the linux world in general. It seems to me it would make it more appealing to .coms to use the free software but..."

foaty writes: "It has been reported that Japanese electronics companies have developed prototypes for fuel-cell batteries that can power the smallest of electronic devices for long periods of time, and they only need refueling, not recharging! See the article at FutureEnergies.com." That article links to this piece at ZDNet; what's interesting is that instead of hydrogen, this article talks instead mostly about methanol-based fuel cells.

nihilist_1137 writes: "Zdnet is reporting that P2P is becoming more used in business. "It's now over two years since a few underground song-swapping services put peer-to-peer technology firmly at the forefront of the IT agenda... A look back at some of the more significant P2P stories of 2001 shows that -- although not a new concept -- P2P is starting to assume a very important role in the corporate space, as tech giants scramble to succeed in this new market."" Hard to believe that the Napster battles have been going on for two years now.

nihilist_1137 writes: "Zdnet is reporting that P2P is becoming more used in business. "It's now over two years since a few underground song-swapping services put peer-to-peer technology firmly at the forefront of the IT agenda... A look back at some of the more significant P2P stories of 2001 shows that -- although not a new concept -- P2P is starting to assume a very important role in the corporate space, as tech giants scramble to succeed in this new market."" Hard to believe that the Napster battles have been going on for two years now.

Matey-O writes "John C. Dvorak's got an interesting article on IBM's behavior towards desktop PCs of late. In short, aside from the profitable laptop sales, their desktop sales lost the company roughly $1B in a serioulsy UP market. Showing no interest in the 20 year anniversary of the desktop, it looks like IBM wants to get out of the industry it effectively started. " Granted, the article is extreme conjecture, but it's still an interesting thought - the Thinkpad group, tho', rocks.

jeffy124 writes: "Red Hat and Lineo, the major spearheads of Embedded Linux, have said that Microsoft's recent white paper comparing Linux and Windows XP embedded is full of inaccuracies, false facts, and overall distorts the value of Linux in general. Lineo has gone as far to say it flat out lies about Linux. ZDNet has Lineo's response, Red Hat comments, and a summary article." Updated by HeUnique: LynuxWorks has also wrote a response (only this one is a bit more detailed).

jeffy124 writes: "Red Hat and Lineo, the major spearheads of Embedded Linux, have said that Microsoft's recent white paper comparing Linux and Windows XP embedded is full of inaccuracies, false facts, and overall distorts the value of Linux in general. Lineo has gone as far to say it flat out lies about Linux. ZDNet has Lineo's response, Red Hat comments, and a summary article." Updated by HeUnique: LynuxWorks has also wrote a response (only this one is a bit more detailed).

jeffy124 writes: "Red Hat and Lineo, the major spearheads of Embedded Linux, have said that Microsoft's recent white paper comparing Linux and Windows XP embedded is full of inaccuracies, false facts, and overall distorts the value of Linux in general. Lineo has gone as far to say it flat out lies about Linux. ZDNet has Lineo's response, Red Hat comments, and a summary article." Updated by HeUnique: LynuxWorks has also wrote a response (only this one is a bit more detailed).